Due to environmental consciousness and high energy costs, reducing power consumption in communication systems has become more and more important. One of the major sources of power consumption in communication systems is a network switch. For instance, in high-capacity network switches used in office networks and datacenters, network switches have often been significant sources of power consumption and heat generation in maintaining high bandwidth access channels for all users. According to a conventional method of reducing power consumption in network equipment, a programmable power supply has been used to power off a group of office equipment including a network switch during nights and weekends. However, such a method results in causing inconvenience to occasional users of the networks during a period that the network equipment is powered off. Accordingly, there is a need for a system for reducing power consumption in network equipment during a period of network inactivity while conveniently allowing access to the network for occasional network users during the period of inactivity.